In 1964, Malcolm X told us that we were at a critical juncture in the fight for freedom. He was right about that. In July of that year President Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act. That summer, black and brown Americans in cities across the country took to the streets in confrontations with the racist police that oppressed their neighborhoods. The violence of the police state against poor, black and brown people is as bad as it was in 1964, with stop and frisk laws, high surveillance, and the mechanisms of the war on drugs incarcerating black men at 7x the rate of white men. In the past year we have seen the brutal tactics of militarized police used against occupy encampments across the country. We see free speech limited to special zones, increasing poverty, and the blatant purchase of elections by the richest few. We stand again at a critical juncture in our history, where we know change is necessary for any chance of freedom and justice, and we must decide how to work toward that change.

In the spirit of learning from our histories and fully engaging this essential question, Education Radio offers Malcolm X's speech " The Ballot or the Bullet."